This post was first published on simonsticker.com
Climate Change, maybe one of the most important topics in human history right now. One of the first real global stories which could only be solved with a global perspective and global action. Millions turned out to see Obama becoming a president, but only 50000 came to protest in Copenhagen. Why?
In my opinion the biggest step to make people understand and care about Climate Change is to make it personal. Not just personal in showing the destruction of lives in Bangladesh, or the droughts in Eastern Africa., but personal in a way that can bring home the message that this is something that will affect is all. Let’s have a look at some interesting projects that cover climate change right now:
NOOR: Consequences
The photo agency NOOR sent out nine photographers to cover different stories from the ‘frontiers of climate change’. Most of the short films show more about how we destroy the world, than the changes taking place and how those changes affects people. If we want to start to cover stories in a way that brings attention and not only great images, nicely shown in exhibitions around the climate conference, we have to do more. I just couldn’t relate enough to what was shown. Maybe the voices of the people, and some video sequences would have changed something for me, maybe that would have made it less abstract, less far away? But don’t get me wrong, the project is strong but it could be more powerful.
Climate Change Documentary
Another great project by danish photojournalist Jakob Dall, also finished for the COP 15. He traveled around the world, taking pictures of different places that are affected by climate change. Interesting is that it is not only covering the far away exotic places, but also places like Denmark or Ireland. Problem again: these are ‘just’ pictures, great in any way, moving, touching, but my concern is the same as with the NOOR project. The images are hard to relate to it, plus they also focus on crisis. The questions I asked myself when I saw the pictures was, is that really an effect of climate change? Again the voices of those featured here would make the work more powerful. Thats said I think that Jabob did in many ways the right thing by getting so close and personal with his images.
Faces of climate change
This project is great. I don’t wanna talk to much about my concerns as it is kind of the same as in the ones before: not personal enough, not close enough to me. This project sometimes feels like art, in the way that pictures relate with the text,. The pictures are great, but maybe to touch me I want something that feels real, rather than like something out of a studio.
This project is powerful in many ways. It covers the problem of climate change worldwide, from the farmer in Italy, to the people in Siberia. It has of all projects the most global approach.
Bangladesh
Another photojournalist from Denmark, Jonathan Bjerg Møller, has made some great stories from Bangladesh, the country that is perhaps right now the biggest affected by climate change. His stories are powerful, close and even when as always it could be more powerful, the story works. The use of b/w is maybe doing its work with its never forgotten relation of crisis . I would liked to know how the stories would have worked in colour, but this is just a personal opinion.
To bring all that critique together at the end: Climate Change is such a big story, but with the internet we could do thise stories better, more close, more personal, with a bigger impact. Making us relate to the problem more intimately would be a great start and one that is sadly often missing. Afterall how else are we going to start caring about the problem?
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